New hive- lots of Q’s!

Hello! New beekeeper here.I live in Santa Barbara California. I picked up my nuc in early April and they did a fast and fantastic job of filling up their first brood box in just two weeks. I added a second box and they are fast at work filling that one too!

Inspections have gone very well, lots of brood and beautiful comb. The 5 frames that came with my nuc were foundationless and fully drawn beautifully. All the frames I have added in the first brood box were also foundationless, but I switched to foundation frames for the second brood box, but checkered a few of the lower frames into the new box. One of the foundationless frames is being drawn out sort of funky and I’m not sure if I should remove the comb and have them rebuild it? How do I go about this if the frame has brood in it?

I have a frame feeder in the first brood box, I have been regularly filling it at each inspection, but they are bringing back lots of pollen on their own so I’m wondering if I should hold off on refilling it for a while? And if so, do I just leave the feeder in the box, or should I remove it and replace with a new frame?

Also, I have been cleaning my bottom tray weekly and today I noticed this white fluff. Upon further inspection, it looks almost like shredded fabric or paper? But I’m not sure. Curious if anyone has any insight.

What do you mean by funky? Wavy or crooked or just with gaps and holes? If it is fresh and soft you can push it straight and the bees with fix it up but you would damage brood doing that.

If they are bringing in nectar then you can remove the feeder and replace it with a frame. However, depending on the flow for your area, and @Dawn_SD may be able to tell you better, you may need to feed them later in the summer.

Was there anything paper in your hive? If not, they are probably just dragging it in and then cleaning it out. Looks kind of like shredded cottonwood fluff but not sure if you have those trees out there.

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